Page 572 - swanns-way

fact, convinced that she had not; the anonymous letter had
put the idea into his mind, but in a purely mechanical way;
it had been received there with no credulity, but it had, for
all that, remained there, and Swann, wishing to be rid of
the burden—a dead weight, but none the less disturbing—
of this suspicion, hoped that Odette would now extirpate it
for ever.
‘Oh dear, no! Not that they don’t simply persecute me to
go to them,’ her smile revealed a gratified vanity which she
no longer saw that it was impossible should appear legiti-
mate to Swann. ‘There was one of them waited more than
two hours for me yesterday, said she would give me any
money I asked. It seems, there’s an Ambassador who said to
her, ‘I’ll kill myself if you don’t bring her to me’—meaning
me! They told her I’d gone out, but she waited and waited,
and in the end I had to go myself and speak to her, before
she’d go away. I do wish you could have seen the way I tack-
led her; my maid was in the next room, listening, and told
me I shouted fit to bring the house down:—‘But when you
hear me say that I don’t want to! The idea of such a thing, I
don’t like it at all! I should hope I’m still free to do as I please
and when I please and where I please! If I needed the money,
I could understand...’ The porter has orders not to let her in
again; he will tell her that I am out of town. Oh, I do wish
I could have had you hidden somewhere in the room while
I was talking to her. I know, you’d have been pleased, my
dear. There’s some good in your little Odette, you see, after
all, though people do say such dreadful things about her.’
Besides, her very admissions—when she made any—of

572 Swann’s Way